


At Christmas I No More Desire a Rose

by Joolz



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Angst, April Showers Challenge, Friendship, Gen, Holidays
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-12-11
Updated: 2002-12-11
Packaged: 2017-10-17 13:43:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/177440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joolz/pseuds/Joolz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A holiday wrestled into submission, and the true spirit found.</p>
            </blockquote>





	At Christmas I No More Desire a Rose

At Christmas I no more desire a rose  
Than wish a snow in May’s newfangled mirth;  
But like of each thing that in season grows.

\--Love’s Labour’s Lost, Shakespeare

Jack sat idly on the sofa with his hands resting on his thighs, regarding the new addition to his living room. The seven foot Blue Spruce was decorated with white lights set to random, slow, fade-and-glow, with shiny gold and white garlands, glass balls of different colors, and wooden ornaments shaped like animals that his grandfather had cut out and his grandmother hand painted. The Christmas tree was beautiful. The Christmas tree was supposed to be making him feel better. The Christmas tree was failing.

Last year Jack had been a basket case. It had been the first Christmas since his son’s death and if that weren’t enough he had just moved into this new house after his wife had left him (not that he blamed her), and had been surrounded by packing boxes. On top of that, he had recently returned from being the first man to set foot on another planet, where he had battled aliens and found his life, and couldn’t even tell anyone about it. The Christmas cheer going around had been too much for him, and he’d spent most of the holiday in the bottom of a bottle.

This year was going to be different. Okay, so the last few months had been more than a little weird, what with the renewed alien hostilities and all. He had lost some more friends, but he was determined not to give in to melancholy. He was damn well going to have a nice, normal, human, merry Christmas if it killed him: thus the tree blinking cheerfully in his living room. It was nice, but something was missing. Maybe an angel for the top, or candy canes. Maybe he should put on a Christmas CD and let Bing Crosby get him in the mood.

Maybe he should just go to bed.

Jack got up and unplugged the light cord from the socket, plunging the room into darkness and leaving the tree nothing more than a looming shadow, misplaced and cold. He shuddered slightly as he realized that he felt much the same way.

O’Neill muttered to himself, “Aw, cut the crap,” and strode purposefully toward his waiting bed.

\-- --

It was Christmas Eve and the base was down to a minimum of personnel. Everyone who had a home to go to was there or on their way. Jack was sitting in the mess hall, one of the few takers for the overly ambitious veal cordon bleu holiday fare. He was pushing the boiled carrots around on his plate when Daniel Jackson walked in, his nose literally buried in a book. Jack admired the instinctual way that the younger man avoided the chairs and other obstacles in his path without ever looking up. He passed down the serving line holding his tray one-handed and barely managed to mumble a “Merry Christmas” in response to the cafeteria worker’s obnoxious salutations. Deeply engrossed in whatever it was, he slid into a chair at a small table on the other side of the room.

Jack noticed how Daniel’s shoulders were pulled in tightly under a bent neck, a frown of concentration almost completely hidden by long, unruly hair as he read and speared carrots at the same time.

A sudden image of the Daniel Jackson he had first met intruded into Jack’s memory. That Daniel Jackson was almost stubbornly unaware of the people around him. He had casually dismissed two years of work by the other scientists, not spitefully, but because he was right and they were wrong. He had seemed to know no fear or self doubt, whether he was explaining the meaning of a ten thousand year old cover stone to a room full of military brass, making the first contact with a multitude of humans on another planet, or facing an alien god. He stood up straight, shoulders broad, and walked forward casually as though he did that kind of thing every day. Jack knew that some of the oblivious confidence was a defense mechanism and that in fact the archaeologist saw and understood a lot more than he let on. He had seen and understood Jack in spite of his carefully maintained shield of aloofness.

That same almost arrogant self-assuredness was still sometimes visible, especially during briefings and interactions with strangers on missions, but in his daily life Daniel had withdrawn into himself to an alarming degree. Jack watched the absorbed scholar chew on the end of his pen, unaware that it was leaking a blue stain onto the corner of his mouth. His cold, half-eaten meal was pushed to one side, and he still hadn’t looked up once.

Jack felt a tightness in his chest as a full realization of exactly how much Daniel had lost washed through him. Daniel’s dreams had come true. He had eagerly chosen to live and work among an authentic ancient culture: to live it rather than just study it. He had fallen in love with a beautiful, brave woman and found himself a home amongst a boisterous extended family. In a matter of minutes it had all been taken from him. What kind of hole would that leave in a man’s soul?

The sound of voices at the table behind Jack broke through his thoughts. Some idiot was urging a friend conspiratorially, "There’s that civilian egghead. Let’s go play some bate-the-geek, what d’ya say?”

O’Neill was just starting to turn around, prepared to kill or at least seriously maim, when another voice at the table stopped him. Ferretti commanded, “Forget it, buck-o. You’re barkin’ up the wrong tree, there.” After a surprised silence, he enlightened his no-doubt open mouthed audience, “Let me tell you something. That man has more balls than all three of you put together.”

The idiot objected, “Fuck that shit. I’m one hundred percent United States Marine.”

Ferretti snorted, “That may be, but you’d still pee in your pants if you had to face half the things he has. Look, I made the same mistake myself, misjudged Dr. Jackson and lit into him. But that was before I knew him. Do you know how many of us are left from that first trip through the Stargate? Exactly three: me, the Colonel and Dr. Jackson. Me, I was lucky. The Colonel was good. But Dr. Jackson saved all our lives, both under enemy fire conditions you can’t even begin to imagine and because he’s just so damn smart. The guy might not look like much, but underneath? Solid. You? You would be lucky to be allowed to shine his shoes. Don’t you forget it, boy.”

As the other mumbled in acquiescence, Jack smiled to himself. Damn if Ferretti hadn’t said it just right.

He stood and deposited his tray in the collection area, then strolled over to the small table. Pulling out a chair he turned it around to straddle it. “Hey, Jackson.”

Daniel glanced up briefly. “Hi, Jack.”

Jack reached out, slid his broad palm onto the open pages of the book, pushed it down onto the table, and closed the cover. Now Daniel looked directly at him, eyes wide and not a little annoyed.

Jack cut him off at the pass. “So, Daniel, can you cook?”

Confused fish-lips fluttered in response. “W..what?”

“I asked if you can cook, because one of us had better be able to if we’re going to have any kind of Christmas dinner tomorrow.”

Guppy-boy was a little slow on the uptake. “Christmas dinner?”

“Yeah. It’s Christmas tomorrow. You know, Deck the Halls and Jingle Bells. Happens every year on December 25th. You’re going to have to help me with the bird, because I’m new at this.”

The thick eyebrows slowly rose up Daniel’s forehead. “You’re inviting me to Christmas dinner?”

“Well, sort of. I’m inviting you to help me make Christmas dinner. You’re gonna have to do your part. So can you cook?”

“I...um...well, ah.…” A rare smile spread across Daniel’s face, reaching the sparkling blue eyes. Then suddenly the light went out, as though he had just remembered that he didn’t have a right to be happy as long as people he loved were suffering. Jack talked on, hoping his words would brush away the ghosts that he knew so well himself.

“I thought about having Teal’c over, too, but he still isn’t allowed off the base. Besides, all this hohoho and sleigh bells stuff would probably freak him out. You and me, though, we’re old hands at Christmas. Bring on Santa and Frosty the Snowman, we can take ‘em. Hell, I even got a tree. So you are going to come, aren’t you?”

The smile was tentative, but it was there. “Yeah, sure.”

Jack stood up again. “Good. Be at my place tomorrow at 10:00 hours, and don’t be late. We have a lot to do.”

He paused, “And… ah… you have…” He waved a finger toward Daniel’s face and motioned with his chin. “…ink there. On your mouth.”

Daniel grabbed his napkin and rubbed furiously. “Is that better?”

Jack grinned at the mess he’d made. “Gettin’ there.”

\-- --

In the event, both of them were very much needed to wrestle the ‘bird’ into submission. Jack had opted for chicken rather than a traditional pork roast, but that didn’t mean he knew how to prepare it.

Daniel placed himself in charge of the cookbook while Jack wielded the baster.

“It says right here, you have to pull the skin up and push pats of butter underneath with your hand.”

“Excuse me? This is a chicken. Its skin is attached.”

“Well, just try it. Just pull it up a little. Yes, like that! Now push the butter in with your fingers.”

“I am NOT putting my hand in there. That’s disgusting. You do it.”

“I can’t do it, I’m holding the book. I would get my hands messy.”

“For crying out loud. I’ll hold the book…”

When he allowed himself to think of it, Jack was nearly floored by the strangeness of it all. On the one hand they regularly went to other worlds hoping to find a wife and her brother who had been abducted by aliens; the same aliens who wanted to wipe all life off the face of the Earth as soon as inhumanly possible. On the other hand they were just two guys trying to cook a chicken. It was so surreal it made him dizzy.

Eventually the bird went into the oven. The microwave would take care of the store-bought cartons of mashed potatoes, gravy and green bean casserole, and there were pecan tarts from the bakery and Cool Whip for dessert.

In the meantime they drank copious amounts of wine and made bets on how deep the snow was going to get outside. In this way Jack and Daniel did Christmas. They talked and laughed and with great pride picked every scrap of moist, tender meat off the chicken bones.

Replete and as satisfied as he had felt in a long time, Jack finished putting the crockery into the dishwasher. When he returned to the living room he found Daniel sitting on the arm of a chair looking at the Christmas tree. The younger man seemed lost in thought, and Jack’s wistfulness returned. He moved silently to stand next to his friend and gently laid his hand on Daniel’s shoulder. Startled, Daniel looked at him in surprise, but didn’t pull away. They stayed like that, contemplating the tree, for several minutes.

The soft lights glistened on the shiny garland and caused bright spots of color to flash from the glass bulbs. The depth and shape of the shadows shifted, now illuminating, now shrouding in darkness. The green branches and simple ornaments spoke of mortality and continuity.

The tree was beautiful. It would be wrong not to appreciate the beauty in life, for as long as the gift of life was still his. To value it would honor those who were gone more than any regret or grief.

Beside him, Daniel whispered, “It’s beautiful,” and Jack could see a sheen of tears in his eyes. Once again they had been thinking the same thing at the same time.

Jack’s voice was gruff as he answered, “Yeah, it is.”

Daniel turned to him and said softly, “Thank you for inviting me over.”

Jack squeezed Daniel’s shoulder lightly and responded, “I’m glad you came.” And he found that he was glad; for Daniel’s company, for the beauty of the tree, for a lot of things.

This Christmas stuff wasn’t so bad after all.


End file.
